There are a number of processes for creating a digital model and producing a three-dimensional solid object of virtually any shape from that model. These processes may be referred to as 3D printing, rapid prototyping, fused-filament or additive manufacturing, and/or the like. One technology involves curing ultraviolet (UV) sensitive resin with a UV light, which may be either a laser or a projection. To print an object, that object is primed with a layer of resin—either by lowering the object into a vat such that a minute layer remains above the object or by dipping the object into a vat until just short of the bottom. The UV light cures the resin into the desired shape for that layer. Because this technology restricts the number of resins to one resin, an object with more colors cannot be fabricated.
Another technology that adds material, such as a thermoplastic filament, in layers involves extruding the thermoplastic filament through printing tool head, which is heated to melt plastic filament such that the melted filament can be moved in both horizontal and vertical directions to fill successive geometries, building each layer, one atop the next. The material hardens almost immediately after extrusion from the nozzle. Because this technology provides a single extruder head for each color and no means for color mixing, a full color three-dimensional object can be fabricated.
These technologies have single or dual-color capabilities, but lack the capability, in terms of, for example, mechanical components, to represent a full gamut or gradations of colors in a color space. In addition, none of the conventional technologies are capable of determining exactly which color to produce because, for one reason, translating a full-color model into machine instructions that generate the full color gamut on the device. Limitations imposed by such conventional technologies, including but not restricted to those mentioned above, inhibit full color three-dimensional object fabrication.